sinning hands
by vega-de-la-lyre
Summary: This can’t last; but she will hold onto it for as long as she possibly can. McCoy/Chapel, Civil War!AU, sequel to southern anthem and scarlet tide.


Well, this'll probably be it, folks! Unless, of course, I get a mad urge to write The Questionable & Highly Illegal Adventures of James T Kirk, Spy and Blockade Runner Extraordinaire, but that seems unlikely at best. Thanks for your lovely feedback on this little trilogy; and enjoy!

* * *

Christine gags.

She is elbow-deep in the belly of a wounded artilleryman, hands slipping in blood and other unspeakable fluids as she tries to stem the free spray of blood from a severed artery and keep his intestines together at the same time. She's usually better than this, she can usually ignore the viscera and the stink, but right now the stench of rot and putrefaction so close to her face is enough to keep her on the edge of passing out, and her stomach quivers.

"Don't you be getting wobbly on me," McCoy says without looking up, voice tight.

"I'm not," she snaps back, and she grits her teeth and holds her breath and holds on as McCoy works and the soldier jumps and screams and wrenches against her hands, very much conscious and aware, as they haven't been lucky enough to get their hands on ether or opium in weeks; she holds on even when the poor man in his mindless agony snatches an evil-looking metal clamp from McCoy's open case and throws it desperately in her direction. It catches her across the face, and the blow sends a searing white-hot bolt of pain through her forehead as it rips through her skin.

"_Christine_," McCoy says, but she shakes her head at him, blinks the stinging blood out of her eyes and ignores the ringing of her ears and the lancing pain and the way her knees threaten to buckle and fail her.

She holds on.

* * *

The soldier dies, of course.

They turn to the next patient, their hands still slick with blood, and then the next, and then the next; Christine picks up her skirts to step over the still-warm body of someone they didn't get to in time, and she swipes at her throbbing forehead, and McCoy's hand at her elbow steadies her briefly, wordlessly, when she sways.

Just after midnight, they find themselves with a brief five minutes of respite before the next wave of wounded arrives. Christine is scrubbing desperately at her nails in a bowl of cloudy red water when McCoy steps suddenly into her field of vision, holding out a pink-stained towel, face quite sober.

"Let's go get that forehead looked at," he says, and when she dries her hands she follows him into his office to find him threading a needle in the wavering lamplight. She closes the door and stands by it, tongue-tied and shy because they've had scarcely a moment alone together since his recovery and return to work; but when he nods his head over to the desk she comes closer and he lifts her on top of it without warning, on top of the sliding mess of papers, his hands just lingering at her waist. He is all business and seriousness now, and she tries to follow his lead and ignore how close he is standing, how warm and near he is.

He rolls his shoulder before he begins; Christine knows that it aches sometimes, in the damp or when he's tired, but his hands on her face are as steady and certain as they've ever been. She is silent while he stitches, feeling her flesh tug unnaturally under the needle and thread and his fingers, the edge of the desk biting hard into her palms where she clutches it. His breath is soft against her ear.

"There," he says when he's done, smearing the last of the blood off her face with the cuff of his coat. She touches it, almost self-consciously, just fingering the precise careful stitches, wincing and raising her eyebrows to get the feel of it; his lips twist ironically and he says, "You know, I've been at this for awhile. I think you can trust me to do this much right, at least."

She kicks her feet as she smiles wryly, and a folder of letters falls to the floor. "The men of my experience aren't the handiest with needlework, so I'm afraid you're working against precedent," she says, but before she's doing speaking his hands slide around her waist and he kisses her suddenly, leaving her stunned and breathless.

"Honey, that's just how I like it," he says with a wicked smile, voice soft and dangerous, and she shivers deliciously; one hand slips up her back as he leans in to kiss her again, and she reaches for him, tracing her fingers lightly and hesitantly up his chest as he knees her legs apart —

Someone bangs open the door behind her, and McCoy pulls away quickly and Christine slams her hand down for balance as Frank, clattering down the hall at a run, calls, "C'mon, the ambulances are arriving" as he goes.

Christine shifts away from McCoy and slides to the floor, mindful of the open door, heart pounding and cheeks pink. She touches his wrist and turns to go, and she can hear him exhale shortly with frustration before he goes out with her into the cool crisp night.

The wound heals without a pucker.

* * *

Time spins on.

A year passes, then two, then three. Things go from bad to worse to downright ugly for the South, and even the most diehard devotees of the Cause can see which way the wind is blowing. In Newnan, they are lucky; they are out of the path of the fighting and the city remains largely undamaged and danger-free, apart from one hectic and tense afternoon when the Yankees try to take the railroad just south of town, one frightening day spent on pins and needles, trying to work even as they're anticipating doom and fire to fall about their ears. Wheeler's men manage to fend them off; Newnan breathes a collective sigh of relief; McCoy finds Christine restocking a supply closet and kisses her senseless, slamming her up against a wall of rattling shelves; and life goes on.

The men keep coming; the bodies pile up.

And then — as with all things — it ends.

* * *

Well, nominally, anyway.

Because here's the thing: drying ink on papers of surrender, declarations of reconciliation — they don't mean a damned thing when you've got thousands upon thousands of casualties your hands. Their hospital is kept, in those first few months at least, about as busy as it ever was with the wounded and diseased while the world around them makes the shaky transition into peacetime, and Christine is perfectly all right with this state of affairs; it means that for now, at least, she can keep nursing, can keep doing the job she loves, and doesn't have to think about the fact that this will soon all be over, that they will fall back into their old roles, that she will have to answer for what she's done by running away —

No. She doesn't want to think about that yet. This can't last; but she will hold onto it for as long as she possibly can.

* * *

On her way to the hospital one misty dark morning Christine sees something that stops her heart dead in her chest — her father, coming out the door of a hotel. She catches herself just in time and steps back behind a corner to watch him walk down the stairs. He moves more stiffly, more tiredly, with more white than brown in his hair and beard; he looks, she realises, _old_.

Her head throbs with questions. What's he doing here? Where's Mother, where are her brothers? They aren't still looking for _her_, are they? More than anything, she wants to run to him, to hug him and tell him everything —

She cuts down a side street to avoid crossing his path, thinking she might soon be violently sick.

At the hospital, the men are looking about as grim as she feels. Frank is hanging over the scarred railing, reading a letter over Joe Beckett's shoulder; the rest of the staff is sitting on the stairs, looking grim.

"They're shutting us down," Joe tells her, flourishing the paper at her. "They want to consolidate the hospitals, move everyone over the big one down on Perry in the next couple of weeks."

Christine looks from face to face, still reeling from the sight of her father, unable to quite take it in. "So," she says. "So what does that mean for us?"

Frank shrugs a shoulder. "Some of us they'll keep on and transfer, but the rest of us — " He waves one hand eloquently. "McCoy was just personally requested by the boys in Washington. Apparently he did one of them a good turn in prison, and they want him for some project or another — "

"Where is he, anyway?" Christine says despite herself, trying to sound casual; she knows he's supposed to be on the next shift, but he's nowhere to be seen.

Joe speaks up. "His wife just got into town this morning," he says, and there's a bitter edge to his voice. "Funny timing, isn't it, just when we get told we're all about to clear out?"

And Christine understands, quite clearly, that her future has already been decided for her.

* * *

The hallway to her parent's rooms at the hotel is perhaps the longest she's ever walked in her life.

She only realises how tightly she's been wringing the fringes of her shawl when her knuckles ache as she goes to rap on the door; she swallows hard, and puts her head down, and waits.

Her father answers the door.

"You foolish, foolish girl," is the first thing he says, but he embraces her all the same, and she can feel his hands trembling.

"I'm sorry," she says, "I'm so sorry," and she's babbling and crying and teetering this close to falling apart —

"Christine?" her mother's voice calls from inside, and that's about all it takes to push her over the edge. She trips into the room proper to find her mother sitting within, her face white —

"Mother," she says, and sinks to the floor, burying her head in her mother's skirts. She's past crying now, but her whole body shudders as her mother runs her hands through her hair soothingly.

"Where have you been?" Mother's voice is soft and not at all accusing, and it mortifies Christine to her core. "What on earth have you been doing?"

"I sent letters," she protests weakly, and her father scoffs:

"Twice a year, if that," he says, but he's still smiling.

Her mother reaches down and cups Christine's wet cheeks in her hands. "You've grown up," she says, eyes shining, "my little girl," and Christine realises for the first time, her heart twisting shamefully, exactly how selfish she's acted. She ran off and abandoned her family in the middle of a _war_; who does that? What good is it to act in the name of some high-minded ideal when you leave your own flesh and blood to an uncertain and probably miserable fate?

"Come home," Mother says, and Christine nods, feeling sick.

"I will," she says, and her mother's brilliant smile makes her heart twist further. "But not yet, I have to — there are things I need to do."

* * *

Maybe he's at the hospital now, she thinks as she makes her way quickly down the road, skirting a clattering wagon, but she rather hopes that he isn't, that she can leave him a letter, that she doesn't have to face him —

Someone small flies into her stomach, a blur of bouncing blonde curls and pink skirts, knocking the breath from her lungs briefly.

"Careful, sweetheart," she says, quickly recovering as she kneels to catch the little girl around the waist and hold her still. "Where are you off to in such a hurry?"

The girl smiles up at her, blonde hair bouncing, and Christine's heart stops when she recognises her face, the stubborn set of her brow even as she hears an achingly familiar voice call, "Joanna _McCoy_, you get back here — "

"I was racing Daddy," Joanna informs her quite seriously. "But he isn't very good at racing."

"I'm terribly sorry — Mrs Dixon," McCoy says when he comes up behind his daughter, out of breath but grinning, and her lips just twitch at the almost-slip. "I'm afraid this child has all the manners of a barn cat."

"Just like her father, then," the woman who follows him says dryly, and Christine feels a sudden pang when she realises who she is.

If Christine's being fair, she'll have to admit that McCoy's wife is pretty as she smiles, extremely pretty, and her clothes look fresh and new enough that she leaves Christine feeling slightly shabby but at the same time there's a guardedness behind her eyes, a tightness around her mouth that leaves Christine wondering.

"Jocelyn," McCoy says, "this is Mrs Dixon, one of my nurses."

Christine lifts her chin. "Mrs McCoy," she says, and nods to her with a smile that she hopes doesn't looks as false as it feels.

"You work with my husband at the hospital," his wife says, reaching for Joanna's hand with a reproving arched eyebrow. The little girl looks quite cross and stares longingly up into the scaffolding to watch the men at work on the new warehouse. "I do hope you're taking care of him, I know he works far too much."

Christine almost laughs, the irony's altogether too much, but she bites her tongue.

"Don't worry, ma'am, we all look after him," she says, and McCoy just refrains from rolling his eyes behind his wife's back. "He's the best we've got."

McCoy coughs. "Where are you off to this afternoon, Mrs Dixon?"

"I was just visiting with my family," she says, and McCoy's gaze narrows on her face, his eyes both knowing and wary. "They're here in town, and with the hospital shut down I'll be going back home with them when they leave."

McCoy's lips part; his wife smiles again and says, "How lovely, it's quite intolerably noisy, living in the city, isn't it," polite and gracious as ever, and when she takes McCoy's elbow it's perfectly clear that she's ready to move on.

Christine bobs down in a hurried goodbye and shakes Joanna's hand quite solemnly and is incredibly, unspeakably relieved when she is past them and down the street.

She knows he is not looking at her as she walks away, that his attention is where it should be, on his wife and daughter, but the back of her neck prickles nonetheless as she sweeps her skirts out of the mud.

* * *

Christine is packing haphazardly when someone pounds at the door, loud and adamant.

"I'm coming," Christine calls, and she dashes a hand quickly across her eyes and checks her face in the sole warped and green-tinged mirror she possesses; her eyes and nose are inescapably pink. She blinks fast, and sniffs. "Just hold on." She hastily throws on a wrapper over her chemise and holds it tight against her throat as she opens the door, expecting to see Mrs Cody, her landlady, it's long after dark and virtually no one knows where she lives anyway, not even her parents yet —

It's McCoy, looking tortured, his fine trim clothes completely drenched through. He's turning his dripping-wet hat over and over in his gloved hands; drops of rain are beaded on his lowered lashes. She opens her mouth to speak, but nothing comes out, and when he throws a hurried look over his shoulder she stands back wordlessly to let him in,  
locking the door behind him.

He looks around her small sitting room; her battered old valise is open on the sofa and her clothing is strewn about the place unfolded. Christine flushes, and is acutely aware of how inadequately she is dressed, her hair loose over her shoulders, her bare toes sinking into the sparse carpet.

"You're really leaving, then," he says, setting his hat down, peeling off his gloves. He doesn't look up at her.

Her fist clenches on the collar of her dressing gown, and she opens her other hand wide, mutely pleading. "I have to," she says. "They need me at home, and there's nothing here for me anymore."

"Nothing?" he says, sounding strangled, and he steps forward, eyes fixed on hers. "Honey, that's just not fair."

"Not _fair_," she repeats flatly, and his responding flinch is barely perceptible. "Why are you here, Doctor McCoy?"

"I didn't know," he says. "Believe me, I found out when everyone else did. I would have given you warning, I didn't want — "

He opens and closes a fist, and a lock of wet hair falls over his forehead. "I couldn't let you go," he says, dark eyes earnest. "Not without telling you — oh, God damn it, Christine — "

"What do you want from me?" she says, trying to sound proud, but her voice comes out ragged.

He takes a deep breath, and when the words come, they are both inevitable and startling. "I love you," he says, and she crosses the room swiftly and kisses him desperately, standing as tall on her toes as she can, twining her arms hard and tight around his neck to pull his face down to hers. He half-sighs into her mouth and kisses her back, frantic and messy, his hands trailing down the deep curve of her spine to draw her close against his body as he slides her wrapper off and leaves it in a blue heap of fabric on the floor. Her now damp-through chemise slides off one shoulder, and he kisses it hard, teeth scraping across her skin, hand fisting into delicate muslin.

Her nails rake up the back of his neck and flex into his scalp; "Oh, hell," he says into her hair, and they blindly stumble backwards together into her bedroom as he kisses his way up her jaw and behind her ear —

* * *

— she bites her lip, lightheaded with pain, and is only dimly aware of it when he speaks, his breath hot against her hotter cheek: "Are you — "

"Yes," she gasps out.

"Do you want me to — "

"No," she says, half- hiccoughing, half-laughing, because she couldn't stop now even if she wanted to, and she tugs his head down so she can kiss him again, quick and wet —

* * *

" — oh," she says, "_oh_," and she sucks in a hard shaky lungful of air as her vision dizzily slams to black, her hands clenching white-knuckled on the sheets —

* * *

She rakes his hair back from his face with shaking hands, kissing his ear carelessly when he buries his face in the sweat-slick curve of her neck.

"Don't you leave me," he murmurs, "please don't leave me, _please_."

She isn't sure if he's at all aware of what he's saying, so she draws back to be sure, breathing hard. "What would you have me do?" she says, eyes steady on his, and she can't help the sharpness of her voice. "What do you want from me?"

His hands slide up inside her thighs as he lowers his mouth to the hollow of her throat and she chokes back an involuntary sigh and twists beneath him, body arching up against his. "Come with me," he breathes against her skin, and she stills, pushing one hand against his shoulder.

"What?" she says as he grasps her hip achingly, bruisingly hard.

"I mean it," he says, and rolls so she is on top of him, her chest pressed into his, gently rising and falling as he breathes quick and hard; he sweeps her tangled curls back out of her face. "Washington, you and me — God almighty, Christine — "

She shifts herself forward slowly and he groans, deep in his throat. "My family," she says, and she catches her lower lip between her teeth, guilt rising up unbidden. "_Your_family. How could we do that to them?"

He doesn't say anything but his eyes fall closed as he leans up to kisses her, measured and lovely, hands tracing up and down her back.

* * *

Christine wakes to find him sitting on the edge of her bed, his head in his hands. It's still long before dawn, and cool; the room is grey-and-blue in the dim half-light of morning.

She stretches and turns over, dragging the blankets with her, propping her chin up on the pillows. "What now?" she asks, and McCoy lifts his head and reaches for her hand.

"I'm not sure of anything but this, sweetheart," he says, and he turns her hand over in his, pressing a hot kiss into her palm.

She curls her cold fingers around his, and holds on.


End file.
